Who Killed Axel Collins? White Lines's Central Mystery, Explained

The show revolves around a mystery: Who killed Axel Collins (Tom Rhys Harries) in Ibiza in the late '90s?

In the finale, we find out who is responsible. Let's unpack the shocking culmination.

This post contains spoilers for the finale of White Lines.

The season finale of White Lines gave us the answer we've been wanting since the first episode, and Zoe Collins (Laura Haddock) had been wanting for 20 years. At last, we learned who killed Axel Collins (Tom Rhys Harries) in Ibiza in the late '90s.

White Lines isn't the kind of mystery with an open-ended resolution, forcing audiences to grapple with ambiguity. Nope: We totally find out what happened to Axel, and Oriol Calafat (Juan Diego Botto), the show's prime suspect, had nothing to do with it.

Chris Harris

The finale brought together the events of Axel's last night alive. He died the evening of his birthday blowout, which Zoe discovered because traces of peacock feathers were found in his lungs (naturally, there were peacocks at the party—this is Ibiza!).

The first glimpses of Axel's birthday party are shown in episode 6, as David (Laurence Fox) flicks through old photos on a projector. In the finale, the party comes to life, and we see what photographs never captured.

Here's what happened to Axel Collins. This is your last chance to turn around, before major spoilers are revealed. You've been warned.

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Axel suffered a painful, drawn-out death.

In the second episode of White Lines, Zoe's father, Clint (Francis Magee), reads aloud findings from Axel's autopsy. As he does so, White Lines cuts to glimpses of Axel's final struggle, which is played out, in full, during the finale.

Here's what you need to remember. Though Axel did not drown, there was chlorine found in his lungs, like from a pool. His ribs were broken. He tried to crawl to safety, but failed. Finally, after reading through that litany of horrors, Clint arrives at the actual cause of death: "An open wound in the dorsal region inflected by a sharp object which severed the aorta. Death was caused by a massive loss of blood."

Netflix

Axel was murdered by his best friends, Anna and Marcus.

Axel's murder was an inside job—and the clues are laid out in the first episode, when Zoe and Boxer (Nuno Lopes), the Calafat's bodyguard, begin their individual investigations into Axel's death.

Both Boxer and Zoe instantly gravitate toward Marcus (Daniel Mays), Axel's best friend. Their instinct is spot-on. Why did Marcus call 15-year-old Zoe and tell her that Axel had left Ibiza for India, never to return? Because he knew what really happened to him.

Chris Harris

Now we do, too. The evening of Axel's birthday party, Anna (Angela Griffin) and Axel had a major disagreement (more on that, later). After taking a hit of cocaine, Axel sank into the pool. Anna, overwhelmed with rage, drowned him. He didn't resist her efforts.

Then, she recruited her then-husband, Marcus, to steal Oriol's car keys, and bury Axel's body. But there was an unforeseen twist: Axel was still alive. He got out of the trunk, only to have Marcus run him over. Like Rasputin, Axel survived. Finally, Anna killed him with a screwdriver. Ostensibly, the couple then transported him to Almeria on Oriol's speedboat, as they had his keys.

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Right before he died, Axel sold all of his clubs.

Now, let's unpack why Axel and Anna were fighting. A week before he died, Axel sold all six of his extremely successful clubs to Oriol Calafat, and demanded the payment in cash. The night of his birthday party, he burned the profits in a bonfire.

Naturally, Anna was furious. The clubs' profits were always split between Anna, David, Marcus, and Axel. With one decision, Axel took away the friends' financial security, and their positions of power.

Chris Harris

Side note: This explains how the Calafat family came to control the island's nightlife and drug trade. Though the Calafats had always beenrich, they became even more powerful after inheriting Axel's clubs. After the sale, Andreu Calafat (Pedro Casablanc) sent his daughter, Kika (Marta Milans), to the United States, so that she would be spared from her family's increasingly criminal enterprises.

Why did Axel make such a rash financial decision, you ask? He was going through a crisis of conscience due to another one of White Lines's major revelations.

Axel and Anna were having an affair.

Gasp! Yes, Axel slept with his best friend's wife on their wedding night, and multiple times afterward. Right before he was murdered, Axel threatened to tell Marcus about their affair. Anna was motivated to kill Axel because she didn't want to lose her husband.

Marcus remained loyal for years, until she abruptly left him for another man. Marcus didn't know about Anna's infidelity until Kika (Marta Milans), Axel's then-girlfriend, told him 20 years later.

Nick Wall

Axel wanted to start over.

Axel went to Ibiza with a dream—and he fulfilled it. Not long after he arrived at the Balearic island, Axel became tsar of nightlife. However, Axel grew horrified by the personal cost of his hard-partying lifestyle. To his surprise, Axel became the kind of guy who slept with his friend's wife, just for the thrill of it.

By selling the clubs, Axel was trying to start over and escape his poor decision-making. Soon before the party, Axel called Kika, his on-again, off-again girlfriend, and offered her a new start.

Des Willie

What comes next?

White Lines was written with a three-season arc in mind, per Deadline. Now that Zoe knows that Marcus and Anna are responsible for Axel's death, she may report them to the police—but the path to justice will be difficult.

Back in the first episode, a Spanish police investigator told Zoe that in Spain, perpetrators can't be tried for crimes that were committed more than 20 years ago. Essentially, Marcus and Anna are off the hook, so long as they stay in Spain.

Des Willie

So, what are Zoe's options? Trick Anna and Marcus into coming to the U.K.? Put them on a boat to Gibraltar, which is technically U.K. soil? Or, she'll continue to do what she did in the first season: Take matters into her own hands.

This, we know for sure: White Lines' finale ends on another beginning. "You don't realize that your journey is just beginning," Zoe tells herself in the finale. The story isn't over. Season 2, here we come!

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